Chapter 15
"Right well I suppose I should hand you over to SHIELD at some point, but I'm actually pretty happy with you staying right there for as long as your face is as green as your cape."
Loki glared back. "Believe me, if I were up to it I'd be long gone from here. I don't want anything more to do with you petty Midgardians."
"If that were really true, I don't think you'd have come here in the first place. Face it, you missed us." Tony grinned annoyingly.
"Tony…" Bruce warned.
But Loki didn't dignify that with a response. He was clearly thinking hard.
"Wow… did he just… completely ignore me? Maybe I should go phone Fury after all."
Bruce sighed. Tony didn't like being ignored. "Tony, why don't you go make breakfast or something? I'll keep an eye on this one."
"Wow, dismissed too. It's not like I'm… I dunno, the owner of this building or something…"
"Tony."
He rolled his eyes and left grumpily with a muttered 'fine.'
Bruce turned back to Loki, who seemed not to have noticed Tony leaving. He sat cross-legged a respectable distance from the man. His wariness of this man was outweighed by his curiosity at his obvious confusion and distress. He wanted to know more.
"What are you thinking?" he asked.
Loki looked up as though just remembering he wasn't alone. Upon realising that Bruce was the only other person with him, a nervous edge appeared in his demeanour. Bruce recognised that look immediately. When he was younger it would have caused a spike of anger that people looked at him and immediately felt nervous, but he had long since become used to that response. And frankly, for Loki, it was a well justified concern. He smiled slightly, but there was a sad edge to his eyes.
"You don't need to worry," he pointed to his chest, "as long as you don't do anything stupid."
Loki widened his eyes in a surprisingly honest expression, "That's why I'm worried."
Bruce chuckled lightly. "Well, I'll do my best not to get angry, and you do your best not to be stupid, deal?"
The man nodded slightly and returned to his thoughts.
"I find that if you're trying to put pieces together, it helps to talk." Bruce prompted.
Loki scoffed. "Right, so that you can pass as much info as you can on me to that SHIELD you keep going on about."
"I don't give a damn about SHIELD. They dragged me away from where I was doing good, to come and destroy half of this city in the hopes that I'd also take you out in the process."
Loki winced slightly at the memory. "Well, if it means anything, I think you did a pretty good job of both."
"Apparently not good enough."
Loki looked mock-hurt. "I missed you too."
"Seriously though, what's going on?"
Loki made an angry sound, frustration returning to his expression. "I get the feeling that someone's playing a rather annoying practical joke on me. Someone powerful. I never drink like this," he gestured to indicate his current state, "so whoever it was must have managed to drug me without me even noticing. And that does not happen often."
"Any ideas who?"
"A few." He looked unhappy. "It's not as though I've tried to take over or destroy multiple realms or something. Though to be fair, the taking over thing was not entirely my fault…"
Bruce raised his eyebrows. "Seemed like it was your fault."
"Well, that was kind of the point." Loki muttered, sounding exasperated.
Bruce thought. "It's interesting, I expected you to take full responsibility for that one."
"Yes, well, I can't deny that the thought of ruling you lot was rather a fun one," he noticed Bruce's expression harden, but continued, "that is of course how they managed to get to me."
"So you're saying the Chitauri used some kind of… mind control on you?"
"Something like that."
"Like what you did to Clint and Erik?"
Loki paused. "Not exactly, no."
The other man waited.
"I manipulated those two with magic."
Bruce thought he could see where this was going. "And…?"
Rather than irritated Loki looked uneasy. "The Chitauri used… other means." He had meant to sound casual, but he couldn't keep the slight shaking from his voice. He blamed it on being drugged.
Hmm, that did shed a different light on things. "You really didn't seem to mind all that much though." He pointed out.
Loki smiled wryly and held his hands out, palm up. "God of Lies."
"That doesn't really help to convince me to believe you, you know."
"I'm well aware."
"So how'd you think you got here?"
"Either someone knows a way of travel between realms that I'm not aware of – possible – or someone brought me here via a path I was unwilling to travel – possible but unlikely considering…" he paused.
Bruce noticed. "Considering?"
"That's the other thing. My usual means of travel is no longer an option. I was ambushed, and I believe still hunted for."
"You can't get past them with magic? Or by tricking them?"
"No."
"So… you're stuck on Earth?"
He gritted his teeth. "…yes."
"Are we going to be put in danger if whatever is pissed at you comes after you?"
Loki frowned. He hadn't thought about that.
"Right then. You look like you're feeling a bit better." The doctor got to his feet. "Want to come get some green tea?"
Loki looked up at the hand offered out to him. He stood by himself silently glad he didn't shake or stumble. Then he nodded and followed the man out of the room.
